It Starts With A Dance
by smolder
Summary: "...and this whole thing with Willow seems to be predicated on the ability to not talk about things."
1. all because of an unread memo

Title: It Starts With A Dance - Part 1  
>Author: smolder<br>Disclaimer: I own nothing. Stargate belongs to Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner. The Buffyverse belongs to Joss Whedon.  
>AN: Reviews are Good. This has been a subtle hint from the author - Please return to your regularly scheduled reading.

"Dance with me."

Jack turned around to find a wide-eyed red head pulling on his arm.

"Seriously, _please_ dance with me." She bit her lip and looked behind her nervously. Jack looked too and saw one of the many other men slicked up in suits for the night (and damn, he really hated these political shindigs. He wasn't cut out for this sort of thing) heading in their direction with an intent look in his eye.

Instantly making a decision and inwardly cursing Danny's bleeding heart sensibilities for rubbing off on him, he grabbed her hand and allowed her to pull them onto the ballroom floor. Once there and a ways away from the man who was persuing her, she let out a deep breath and gave him a relieved smile.

"Thank you," she said simply as they swayed back and forth. At least with something put on by the White House you didn't have to worry about more energetic music. He felt like he was using up his "dancing" abilities as it was.

"What was that all about?" he asked.

She sighed and stepped a bit closer to him, her green dress brushing his shoes for a moment as she craned her neck a bit to scan the area. "That creep kept hitting on me," she began.

"He's over there, so ya know," Jack interrupted her with a grin, dipping his head a bit to the left. He had kept an eye on the guy, but it was funny the way she kept stretching around looking for him.

"Oh," she said, turning her head immediately to look in the direction he indicated. She scrunched up her nose in distaste when she saw him sitting at one of the tables watching them, and he almost thought she was going to stick her tongue out at the man for a moment. But instead she just glared a bit before turning back to face him.

"Anyway," she huffed, "I kept trying to turn him down politely, but he was persistent. Pretty soon the rest of my friends were going to notice. And they're super protective. I mean we all are. Of each other. We can all take care of ourselves, but if someone messes with any of us we go all, grr," she scrunched up her nose and forehead and bared her teeth a little. Jack was trying really really hard not to laugh at the babbling red head in his arms. She continued as if what she was saying was entirely normal, "If I didn't get away from him there might have been a bit of a scene and we all promised to be on our best behavior. So, I grabbed you," she ended with and apologetic smile. "Sorry about that."

"Why me?," he asked, curious. This sure was turning out to be a lot less boring than he thought a black-tie event General Hammond demanded he go to would be, but he really hadn't wanted to deal with any government types. He had been trying his best to put out some serious "Stay Away" vibes, sitting alone at the dark corner of the bar. Jack figured he must really need to work on his vibe-age.

"Honestly? You were there and you seemed way less icky than a lot of the other guys here. I mean, I _know_ my group is the only one that brought mostly women to this thing. But really, some of these guys seem to think just because they're from shady government agencies that the girls should just be falling all over themselves."

Jack winced; he had seen a lot of that going on. Mostly beautiful self-assured girls that seemed barely in their twenties looking thoroughly unimpressed by arrogant men in penguin suits. The whole people-watching aspect had actually been the only amusing part of this gathering, before this woman started using him as her personal shield. And he didn't really mind, she was funny (although he wasn't sure if she meant to be) and it passed the time.

"Soo", he tried to ask casually, "which agency are you from?"

The woman raised an eyebrow at him. "Really?" she said with a playful grin, "and what would you say if I asked you that question?"

"I'm in the Air Force," Jack said, happy to have a solid answer.

"Yes," she said and he twirled her out (Aha! Score! Guess he _could_ do relatively more dancing than rocking back and forth) and she giggled a bit when she came back to him on the return. But she continued easily with her questioning, "But what project?"

"Deep Space –" he started, the usual cover falling easily off his tongue.

She snorted unimpressed.

"It's classified," he said (said, not whined - he didn't care what Danny said that voice sounded like).

"My point exactly," she said shaking her head, "this whole thing make so little senses. It's really baffling. Invite people from all sorts of classified projects to a party. Stick them in one room and what? They all get dressed up, stand around awkwardly and just _know_ that everyone else _knows_ that they're doing important things that they _aren't_ allowed to talk about?"

Jack went cold for a moment as he processed the jumble of what she said. "You think it's a trap then?" he concluded. And damn, why hadn't he thought of that before? Was he really too caught up in the fact that he had been the only one out of his team that somehow hadn't been able to get out of coming here? (_And, come on! How could Teal'c be going to visit the free Jaffa, Sam be needed at Area 51, and Daniel have a scheduled speaking engagement all at the same time? He knew they had to be setting him up. They were probably all sitting around having nice juicy steaks and laughing their asses off. Well, not really. T going through the Stargate was hard to fake. And the plane tickets for Sam and Daniel to Nevada and Oxford, less so….. But, they must have known about this ahead of time to schedule everything. It had probably been in one of those memos or emails or something he never got around to reading. Damn._) All of these people from all of these agencies and classified projects - it would be a great target to take out. It would deal the world a real blow.

But surprisingly the girl laughed, "That's the thing," she said shaking her head, "I really don't think it is. I think this is actually a case of higher ups just being incredibly stupid."

And Jack snorted because honestly, he was still feeling suspicious as hell now but he could really see that. Had seen cases of that happening more times than he could count.

Suddenly she stopped dancing. "Why'd you quit," he asked. "I'm not that bad of a dancer am I?" he teased.

"No, no," she said and she looked slightly uneasy again as she glanced quickly behind her where the other man sat, still waiting at a table. "The song ended," she explained. And he realized it had; it had switched to something else. Really though, a lot of this classical stuff sounded the same to him. "Thanks for the dance….." she trailed off.

And she might be fishing for information like he had been earlier. It didn't seem like it though.

"Jack," he supplied.

"And I'm, Willow," she said with a giggle. "We probably should have done the whole introduction thing before I dragged you out here, huh?"

"I've never been that great at sticking to the rules," he admitted with a grin.

"Well, _Jack_," she said stressing his name playfully. "Thank you for the dance and all, you were super nice. I guess I really should be going….", she bit her lip and began to step away from him.

He held on to her arm loosely and she glanced back at him surprised. Jack had to admit he was a bit surprised too. But, she was a way more entertaining option for getting through this ball (because _seriously_, a _ball_). And he could admit, he didn't like the way that other guy was looking at her, to use her words – it was kinda creepy.

So, that was his reasoning for awkwardly saying, "You know I'm up for another dance since we're already out here and everything." He waved his other hand around loosely.

And the way a smile broke out on her face – relieved, happy, and pleased as she flowed back easily into his arms. Jack couldn't quite feel bad about his decision.


	2. Chewbacca is more efficient than vibeag

Title: It Starts With A Dance - Part 2  
>Author: smolder<br>Disclaimer: I own nothing. Stargate belongs to Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner. The Buffyverse belongs to Joss Whedon.  
>AN: Reviews are Good. This has been a subtle hint from the author - Please return to your regularly scheduled reading.

"I'm way too old for you," he had stated the first time. Because Jack _really_ hadn't been expecting this. They had retreated to his previous little corner of the bar after dancing. He supposed that two people having a rather serious conversation about the merits of Chewbacca's character in the original Star Wars trilogy, (Willow admitted to repeated exposure due mostly to her best friend since childhood – to which Jack heartily commended his taste) was more of a deterrent than his previous vibe-age had been.

And although the guy they had been trying to keep away in the beginning had backed off after the third dance, he had ended up walking her back to her hotel room. It was really more because they had been placed in the same hotel than anything else. Probably all of the people invited had. Yet another horrible security problem that was obvious to anyone using common sense and made them both laugh at the stupidity of people in charge.

That made them both laugh, that is, until leaning against her door Willow (still giggling) had reached up, hooked an arm around his neck, pulled him down a bit to her level, and kissed him.

Jack had blinked stunned for a moment. "Willow….," he started trying to let the young woman down easy.

She glanced down for a second flushing. "I'm not usually this type of girl," she admitted. "But, it's just," she stumbled with her words for a moment. "This has all been so comfortable, you know? Easy and uncomplicated. I don't get a lot of that these days. So, I figured, hey," she looked back up at him with a little self-deprecating smile, "carpe diem. Not that that has worked out so well for me in the past," she muttered the last part under her breath.

And, Jack had to admit, it had been. Easy and comfortable. He had forgotten a bit how it was to talk about something other than work. To talk with someone outside the Stargate program and not have to worry about them asking certain questions. Always being on guard. Because Willow had the same thing. Probably not _exactly_ the same, but she was in the same boat. There were things they simply could not talk about, for national (global, interstellar – damn, with the Quantum Mirror was it interdimensional as well now?) security. It was this mutual understanding, so there was no need to push or ask those sorts of questions. Sure there was curiosity, but there was respect. Neither of them would have been in that room, if the President didn't believe what they did wasn't important to the world.

He couldn't miss either that she was pretty (beautiful really), smart, and funny. Willow seemed to have bits and parts of a lot of his favorite people while being completely and utterly herself. And with her there were no regs - no chance of screwing up team dynamic. Jack's only last defense was their age difference; she was way way too young for someone like him. Which he pointed out to her.

She just gave him a funny little smile and kept her arms looped around his neck and her body pressed against him. "Believe me, in the circles I run in, you are _so_ not old. And not to sound incredibly corny or anything, but it's not really the outside that counts with me."

Jack stared at her for a long moment. "Your right," he said eventually, "that did sound incredibly corny."

Willow snorted and grinned brightly. "I just mean," she took a breath before admitting, "my first crush and my first relationship were both guys but my last two have been women. The packaging isn't what matters the most for me."

"You make us all sound like candy bars," he said, smiling despite himself. Not military then, he had guessed as much from her demeanor, but he doubted she would be just freely spitting out things like that if she was. It didn't bother him at all (seriously, when you're dealing with alien cultures on a daily basis, you try really hard not to recruit homophobes or anyone who had any sort of strong prejudice. It didn't tend to work out).

Willow giggled and played with his collar a bit absentmindedly, "One of my best friends _does_ use the metaphor of cookie dough for her relationships."

"No offense to your friend," Jack said, holding back laughter and hoping she wouldn't take this the wrong way, "but I just had to stop myself from all sorts of bad "half-baked" jokes."

The woman in his arms laughed long and hard burying her face in his suit jacket to stifle the sound. Jack chuckled too, but looked down the empty hallway, realizing he had been simply holding the red-headed woman outside her room for a while now as they talked.

"I'm sorry," she said looking up again and wiping her eyes. "It's just if you know my friends that's _really_ funny."

"Yeah," he said awkwardly as the silence dragged out again.

"Sooo, _Jack_." Willow bit her lip and looked up at him hopefully through her eyelashes, her invitation obvious.

And being with her _was_ comfortable and fun and easy. Willow was right, there really wasn't enough of that in his life either.

This time _he_ leaned down and kissed _her_. Willow releasing her lip from her teeth and giving a little startled breath of surprised pleasure against his mouth. When they parted she gave him that same relieved, happy, pleased grin she had on the dance floor. And when she opened the door to her room and tugged on his hand, he followed with a grin.

And Jack definitely didn't feel bad about his decision.


	3. a pond with no fish

Title: It Starts With A Dance - Part 3  
>Author: smolder<br>Disclaimer: I own nothing. Stargate belongs to Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner. The Buffyverse belongs to Joss Whedon.  
>AN: Reviews are Good. This has been a subtle hint from the author - Please return to your regularly scheduled reading.

Their jobs made meeting up nearly impossible. She seemed to actually have less scheduled down time than he did. And when they actually did seem to match up, a lot of the times he would come home to find a tired sounding apologetic message on his machine or he would have to try to remember to give her a hurried call amidst the chaos of the latest disaster.

Normal work weeks, hours, and holidays usually simply failed to apply when you had to deal with kidnappings, attempted alien invasions, being held captive by natives on planets you _thought_ were friendly, time loops, snarking while getting tortured by beings who had seriously annoying gods complexes, _paperwork_.

It seemed the same applied for Willow.

It became easier to just give her the keys to the cabin so she could just show up whenever she _did_ have off. If he could come by too, great. If not, well, he had seen how exhausted she got – how world weary (her eyes so old). Like him, she gave all she had to her job (and it seemed, like him, she considered it to be much more than a job), she deserved a safe place to crash and get away from the pressure of it all for a while.

(aaaaa)

Sometimes they just laid around in bed watching movies and TV shows. Large box sets of things they always wanted to see, but had never gotten around to because of their jobs.

Serenity and Firefly seemed to hit a bit too close to home for both of them. He knew why it did for him. A group of tarnished ex-soldiers and their crew who are so close that they become family trying to survive and make their way through space? No parallels there. Yeah, sure. You betcha.

But, the way she shook against him when the crazy young girl, River, fought the Reavers. And he could have swore she whispered "Dana", before she turned away from the screen and pressed her face into his arm. It was just another mystery.

(aaaaa)

They seem to spend a lot of time in the kitchen.

She makes cookies and he makes Jell-O. And they know neither are even remotely healthy, but they both get an overblown amount of enjoyment from doing these normal things. Laughing and joking while the room is filled with the smell of sugar and baking things.

Normal. Because really, would either of them have been in that ballroom if their jobs were normal?

(aaaaa)

If he had ever worried that being with her was somehow ruining her – that her life was untouched and innocent before him, her body tells another tale.

There are scars all over her. Some he recognizes with a military trained eye as knife wounds of different blades (some on her hands and arms – thin, from a sharp blade - possibly self-inflicted). But others, others look like bite marks and burns.

He will run his fingers over them and he knows his face must show his questions, but her eyes are solemn and she doesn't answer. Jack doesn't push.

And when _her _hands gently touch bullet wounds, burns, old knife wounds or that area that was still red from the ribbon device one time when she was here - Willow meets his eyes in understanding and returns the favor.

(aaaaa)

They'll sit out on his little pier by the lake at night and he'll identify star constellations for her. It might seem like he spends more time studying alien skies these days, but Jack still remembers the things he memorized for his masters.

She follows the length of his arm and stares, soaking up the information he is telling her. He knows if he asked later, Willow would be able to spit this all back out to him. It makes him laugh sometimes, how absolutely surrounded he is by blindingly smart women.

But Willow likes being outside during the day, too. She will lean against a tree, barefoot and eyes closed, with the sun against her face while he "fishes".

They are both perfectly content with the stillness.

(aaaaa)

Their back and forth e-mail chain is way in the 100's by now. The thing is, they don't talk about anything. They can't talk about the work that they both know the other is taking a break from to write the response - they wouldn't even want to try (Jack knows, on his side at least, there are programs to pick up if you're leaking information anyway).

All the e-mails consist of are quotes. Quotes from the movies and tv shows they have watched together – like this long running inside joke. It always makes him smile to read it (he sometimes finds himself scrolling back through past exchanges instead of doing paperwork. Then again, he also sometimes finds himself throwing a rubber ball at the wall instead of doing paperwork).

(aaaaa)

All Jack's team knows is that he pesters them to go fishing (by a pond with no fish) less. The times he meets up with Willow are sporadic and his team still spends plenty of time bonding off hours, so they have no reason to ask.

He's not entirely sure why he hasn't told them, SG-1 is practically his family after all. Maybe because it would be really weird to try and explain (and they might have never actually been _together_, and probably never could have, but he doesn't want to hurt Sam either). And this whole thing with Willow seems to be predicated on the ability to _not _talk about things.

Plus, what Willow and he have isn't quite a relationship of the sort you can solidly define. It's easy comfort, physical human contact, and just _being_ with someone else for a while with no expectations. He had forgotten how nice that was.


End file.
